Going "all in" on external focus of attention ?

[icehorse]

25 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

He did cite Adam Young as his source for saying mats are good. Though nothing ive found so far from Young supports the claim that mats are in fact good.

If I said that (which I don't think I did), it was a typo.

 

Adam young is NOT a fan of mats.

[icehorse]

43 minutes ago, GoGoErky said:

Quote the post with your example as I didn’t see it

 

please give all the ones you have to back up your claims.

 

It’s not commons knowledge and if there was a limitation to it two if the coaches on this forum wouldn’t use them not works AMG, George Gankas, Shabueen Nakjavani (all high level coaches) as well as many others.

 

so he’s enlightening us with your common knowledge 

 

Dollars to donuts the good coaches you're referring to would rather NOT use mats if they could avoid them. But the reality is that mats are often the only option available to coaches.

[SNIPERBBB]

5 hours ago, icehorse said:

6 hours ago, SNIPERBBB said:

who be they?

 

Over the years I've spent a lot of time as a poster of controversial claims 🙂

So this is not the first time I've been asked (more or less), for citations. I don't know whether debating styles are discussed here, but for now I'd say that I find most requests for citations to be boring, and a distraction. If that's not your intention, I apologize, but it strikes me that you could answer your own question with the use of your helpful search engine.

 

With all that said, off the top of my head, Adam Young is one such prominent coach. If you are sincerely interested in this topic, I would direct you to some of the more popular golf podcasts.

6 minutes ago, icehorse said:

32 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

He did cite Adam Young as his source for saying mats are good. Though nothing ive found so far from Young supports the claim that mats are in fact good.

If I said that (which I don't think I did), it was a typo.

 

Adam young is NOT a fan of mats.

[GoGoErky]

38 minutes ago, SNIPERBBB said:

 

I dont play in that sandbox so I dont know what they say I tend to tune out when the jargon gets too thick. 

 

Playing golf after playing baseball/softball is akin to learning how to walk again after a car crash. Your mind wants to make body move in the way it did before the crash.  The rehab therapist is going to have to help convince your mind that it cant do that anymore and you have to relearn how to move again. You dont just change something youve done for 20-30 years overnight. Baseball swing is a very top hand dominated swing, right hand for righties. In golf its a mostly left hand dominated action. Lot of baseball players struggle with over active right hand. Never went down TGM Hitter road so maybe that helps former baseball guys more.

Totally agree. I’m a format baseball and softball player and have several golf buddies who are former baseball players to include for meme coworkers who prior to injuries were in double A. We have all had to retrain our bodies for a good golf swing. Some did it sooner, myself golf was just one think I did on top of several other sports including numerous weekends a month in tournaments. 
 

once I took golf serious I had to get rid of the baseball habits 

[icehorse]

15 minutes ago, Hawkeye77 said:

 

There isn't any tone but you said you answered the questions, told someone else you answered them and . . . you didn't.  Let's not switch the goalposts. You said they were fair questions, claimed you answered, you didn't, claimed again you answered, you didn't, and now you avoid answering. What's the context for all this?  It's a golf forum. You coach horses? CEO's (we've got one!)?

 

Yet again:

 

What is your golf background?

What is your experience in terms of learning about and understanding the golf swing?

What is your experience actually educating people about golf other than getting the HS girls from shooting in the 120s down to the 110s? Other such athletic coaching experience with real individuals?

 

 

 

Who's asking? 

 

And again do you think cognitive skill acquisition is important in sports coaching?

 

And I'll ask a few more questions: earlier some posters were saying that athletes coming to golf already had good proprioception, do you agree?

 

Now I'm hearing from a poster that it's hard to go from baseball to golf. (which doesn't seem to hold up well when you look at celebrity Pro-Ams 😉  )

So how about coaching other sports, does that count in your mind?

 

So what criteria are you using to assess my experience, and what credentials do you have to make such assessments?

 

And I guess finally, if you actually read what I've written and stop strawmanning me, what's got your knickers in such a twist?

[GoGoErky]

8 minutes ago, icehorse said:

 

Dollars to donuts the good coaches you're referring to would rather NOT use mats if they could avoid them. But the reality is that mats are often the only option available to coaches.

Again dodging the question.

 

GG has made a very nice living teaching at the same club off mats and has some very high level juniors oh and Matt Wolff and has worked with numerous other pros. Pretty sure if he felt mats were bad  he could find a place to go teach.

 

Shauheen and AMG invested large amounts of money into indoor studios .

[icehorse]

1 minute ago, GoGoErky said:

Totally agree. I’m a format baseball and softball player and have several golf buddies who are former baseball players to include for meme coworkers who prior to injuries were in double A. We have all had to retrain our bodies for a good golf swing. Some did it sooner, myself golf was just one think I did on top of several other sports including numerous weekends a month in tournaments. 
 

once I took golf serious I had to get rid of the baseball habits 

 

Well it seems everyone on this thread has agreed that it's hard work to learn to hit golf balls well.

 

With that said, how do you know that your baseball background made learning golf any harder? What are you comparing your experience against? How do you that your baseball background didn't make learning golf - while still difficult - slightly less difficult than if you didn't have baseball skills?

[icehorse]

1 minute ago, GoGoErky said:

Again dodging the question.

 

GG has made a very nice living teaching at the same club off mats and has some very high level juniors oh and Matt Wolff and has worked with numerous other pros. Pretty sure if he felt mats were bad  he could find a place to go teach.

 

Shauheen and AMG invested large amounts of money into indoor studios .

 

Whenever I see pros warming up before tournaments, they are hitting off of grass, not mats. I suspect that if pros showed up to a tourney and all the driving range offered was mats they would make quite a commotion, correct?

[GoGoErky]

2 minutes ago, icehorse said:

Who's asking? 

 

And again do you think cognitive skill acquisition is important in sports coaching?

 

And I'll ask a few more questions: earlier some posters were saying that athletes coming to golf already had good proprioception, do you agree?

 

Now I'm hearing from a poster that it's hard to go from baseball to golf. (which doesn't seem to hold up well when you look at celebrity Pro-Ams 😉  )

So how about coaching other sports, does that count in your mind?

 

So what criteria are you using to assess my experience, and what credentials do you have to make such assessments?

 

And I guess finally, if you actually read what I've written and stop strawmanning me, what's got your knickers in such a twist?

And again dodging.

 

several people have asked and you have refused to answer despite claiming you already answered. Just like you tell others go and look what was posted, see who asked.

 

you want to play let me ask questions yet refuse to answer. I’ve already answered your question that cognitive learning is not important to the mechanics in any sport,  What do you do when the student continues to slice the ball off the planet when cognitive learning doesn’t prevent it 

[wildcatfan9698]

2 minutes ago, icehorse said:

How do you that your baseball background didn't make learning golf - while still difficult - slightly less difficult than if you didn't have baseball skills?

This question cannot be answered and you know it.  All of us who played baseball for years could not possibly answer your question if playing baseball made learning golf easier than not playing baseball.  Stupid question quite honestly.

[GoGoErky]

10 minutes ago, icehorse said:

 

Well it seems everyone on this thread has agreed that it's hard work to learn to hit golf balls well.

 

With that said, how do you know that your baseball background made learning golf any harder? What are you comparing your experience against? How do you that your baseball background didn't make learning golf - while still difficult - slightly less difficult than if you didn't have baseball skills?

Theres never been a debate that the golf swing is hard to learn. Theres nothing intuitive about it and its unnatural movements.

 

For someone who doesn’t like to be misquoted you sure do misquote people.

 

 

How about you start answering questions instead asking and dodging the questions you get asked 

Edited February 25 by GoGoErky

[GoGoErky]

5 minutes ago, icehorse said:

 

Whenever I see pros warming up before tournaments, they are hitting off of grass, not mats. I suspect that if pros showed up to a tourney and all the driving range offered was mats they would make quite a commotion, correct?

Strawman argument and deflecting 

 

provide your list of all the instructors who acknowledge the extreme limitations of learning golf on mats. Why don’t you state what those extreme limitations are while at it.

 

Edited February 25 by GoGoErky

[wildcatfan9698]

Just now, GoGoErky said:

How about you start answering questions instead asking and dodging the questions you get asked 

I read it all and gained nothing from his posts so I no longer care what his answers are, I've seen enough to know it won't matter.  Back to TGL and my cocktail

[SNIPERBBB]

13 minutes ago, icehorse said:

 

Now I'm hearing from a poster that it's hard to go from baseball to golf. (which doesn't seem to hold up well when you look at celebrity Pro-Ams 😉  )

for kicks i looked at this years pebble pro am and only one former MLB player was under a 10 cap. and he was a pitcher.

[otto6457]

3 minutes ago, icehorse said:

Not a dodge.

 

I don't respond well to strawman arguments and bullying. Once we get past that, we can converse.

 You aren't very good at this. 

 

You are the one that started the "bullying" by playing the poor misquoted victim in order to dodge your responsibility to support your position, with something more valid than your wandering and bloviating personal opinion.  I'm simply the person that got tired of your unsupported nattering and your evasion of real questions.

 

I also find it quite entertaining how completely you ignored my simple challenge.  Every coach that calls this forum home, takes the time to help members with their golf swings.  They constantly post videos and give concrete instruction on solving the swing issues of amateur golfers of all handicaps.  You on the other hand have contributed nothing but word salad and obfuscation.  But you do like to pretend to be here to save the unwashed from "positional teaching". 

 

It then became abundantly clear you have no understanding of HOW the golf swing should actually function above the level of a 40 handicap player.

 

A far as I can tell, your idea of a "conversation" is for us to cheer on your brilliant personal discovery as long as we don't ask too many questions or ask to see your teaching in action.

 

Feel free to add me to your ignore list if my pointed style upsets your tender sensibilities.

[Hawkeye77]

17 minutes ago, icehorse said:

[nonsense]

What is your golf background?

What is your experience in terms of learning about and understanding the golf swing?

What is your experience actually educating people about golf other than getting the HS girls from shooting in the 120s down to the 110s? Other such athletic coaching experience with real individuals?

 

 

[GoGoErky]

15 minutes ago, otto6457 said:

 You aren't very good at this. 

 

You are the one that started the "bullying" by playing the poor misquoted victim in order to dodge your responsibility to support your position, with something more valid than your wandering and bloviating personal opinion.  I'm simply the person that got tired of your unsupported nattering and your evasion of real questions.

 

I also find it quite entertaining how completely you ignored my simple challenge.  Every coach that calls this forum home, takes the time to help members with their golf swings.  They constantly post videos and give concrete instruction on solving the swing issues of amateur golfers of all handicaps.  You on the other hand have contributed nothing but word salad and obfuscation.  But you do like to pretend to be here to save the unwashed from "positional teaching". 

 

It then became abundantly clear you have no understanding of HOW the golf swing should actually function above the level of a 40 handicap player.

 

A far as I can tell, your idea of a "conversation" is for us to cheer on your brilliant personal discovery as long as we don't ask too many questions or ask to see your teaching in action.

 

Feel free to add me to your ignore list if my pointed style upsets your tender sensibilities.

The funny thing is his OP he states he’s going to make a strawman proposal, then confirms on with several strawman arguments in the thread. Hates to be misquoted yet misquotes others.

 

 

[iacas]

On 2/23/2025 at 11:01 AM, iacas said:

For example I had to get a student to bend his left knee more late in the backswing and early in the downswing and we did perfectly well just saying that.

 

I'm curious @icehorse, how you'd have handled that situation.

 

The player in question was a former Korn Ferry Tour player and current +3. He swung his 6I at 100 MPH.

 

What he was doing: keeping the left knee flexed about the same amount from P2.5 to P5 and then extending it only. This led to a big lateral shift (late) and a limited vertical push and thus limited "opening" of the pelvis/"hips."

 

What I had him do: feel that as he got to about P3 (his feels didn't necessarily match the timing of when they truly occurred), he added flex to his left knee so he could "fall" or "land" left earlier. This did two things: 1) created momentum so he could begin shifting forward earlier, and 2) "loaded" his left leg more (glutes, quads, hamstrings, etc.) so that when it came time he could "push" or "extend" or "jump" more to spike the verticals and get more open instead of following through with a "saggy knee."

 

Now, this player is a little bit better than a 120-shooting high school girl, but I think you've said you would teach this guy without talking about any body parts and weren't even sure you would talk about the club as an "external" thing.

 

So, how would you teach this guy to do that stuff without mentioning body parts or mechanics?

 

FWIW the guy was thrilled with what we did, and saw really good results.

 

 

———————————

 

As a follow-up to some other things I've seen:

• The studies for "external" versus "internal" focuses are often poorly conceived or planned. I'm not going to get into the weeds on these as they've been discussed before. Relying on them as the foundation for your instructional angle is unadvisable, IMO. Ditto the block vs. random practice stuff. Bad studies so far.
• I like to teach off mats. It forgives some students of some fat shots that really discourages them from trying new things or being uncomfortable for a bit, it neutralizes the lie and conditions so they can focus on the mechanics they're looking to change, etc.
• I'm not a big fan of self organization here. I've said before and I'll say again: students looking to "self organize" often end up making themselves worse.
• You seem to have made a lot of generalizations in this topic about what "instructors" or "coaches" do but I don't know many of the coaches/instructors you seem to think are plentiful.
• I use as many modes of learning and explanation and stuff available. Visual learners aren't always best at learning visually with everything. I fire hose blast people with as many options and variations as I can in the time given, because even if they pick up a little bit from other methods, it's additive.

Alas, my navel needs more gazing, so I'm off to do that now. I mean, I didn't coach too many girls last year to get down from shooting 120 to 110. I did coach four of the five girls who won the State Championship, though (they'd have won if they counted their worst scores instead of their best, too). So that's something, to me at least.

 

Edited February 25 by iacas
fire hose, not fire host

[Ross_Albatross]

1 hour ago, otto6457 said:

 You aren't very good at this. 

 

You are the one that started the "bullying" by playing the poor misquoted victim in order to dodge your responsibility to support your position, with something more valid than your wandering and bloviating personal opinion.  I'm simply the person that got tired of your unsupported nattering and your evasion of real questions.

 

I also find it quite entertaining how completely you ignored my simple challenge.  Every coach that calls this forum home, takes the time to help members with their golf swings.  They constantly post videos and give concrete instruction on solving the swing issues of amateur golfers of all handicaps.  You on the other hand have contributed nothing but word salad and obfuscation.  But you do like to pretend to be here to save the unwashed from "positional teaching". 

“Let me see that swing Otto. Yeah, not sure you can own it, you see, you gotta feel the flow, like water. Bruce Lee that ball to draw back, Otto, be water, find it so you own it under pressure, become the ball!”

[MonteScheinblum]

14 minutes ago, iacas said:

 

I'm curious @icehorse, how you'd have handled that situation.

 

The player in question was a former Korn Ferry Tour player and current +3. He swung his 6I at 100 MPH.

 

What he was doing: keeping the left knee flexed about the same amount from P2.5 to P5 and then extending it only. This led to a big lateral shift (late) and a limited vertical push and thus limited "opening" of the pelvis/"hips."

 

What I had him do: feel that as he got to about P3 (his feels didn't necessarily match the timing of when they truly occurred), he added flex to his left knee so he could "fall" or "land" left earlier. This did two things: 1) created momentum so he could begin shifting forward earlier, and 2) "loaded" his left leg more (glutes, quads, hamstrings, etc.) so that when it came time he could "push" or "extend" or "jump" more to spike the verticals and get more open instead of following through with a "saggy knee."

 

Now, this player is a little bit better than a 120-shooting high school girl, but I think you've said you would teach this guy without talking about any body parts and weren't even sure you would talk about the club as an "external" thing.

 

So, how would you teach this guy to do that stuff without mentioning body parts or mechanics?

 

FWIW the guy was thrilled with what we did, and saw really good results.

 

 

———————————

 

As a follow-up to some other things I've seen:

• The studies for "external" versus "internal" focuses are often poorly conceived or planned. I'm not going to get into the weeds on these as they've been discussed before. Relying on them as the foundation for your instructional angle is unadvisable, IMO. Ditto the block vs. random practice stuff. Bad studies so far.
• I like to teach off mats. It forgives some students of some fat shots that really discourages them from trying new things or being uncomfortable for a bit, it neutralizes the lie and conditions so they can focus on the mechanics they're looking to change, etc.
• I'm not a big fan of self organization here. I've said before and I'll say again: students looking to "self organize" often end up making themselves worse.
• You seem to have made a lot of generalizations in this topic about what "instructors" or "coaches" do but I don't know many of the coaches/instructors you seem to think are plentiful.
• I use as many modes of learning and explanation and stuff available. Visual learners aren't always best at learning visually with everything. I fire host blast people with as many options and variations as I can in the time given, because even if they pick up a little bit from other methods, it's additive.

Alas, my navel needs more gazing, so I'm off to do that now. I mean, I didn't coach too many girls last year to get down from shooting 120 to 110. I did coach four of the five girls who won the State Championship, though (they'd have won if they counted their worst scores instead of their best, too). So that's something, to me at least.

I actually have an analogous situation.

 

I also coach youth football.

 

I coached a group of 3rd grade boys who were taking the point of the ball off their faces and dropping nearly 100%.  After giving them a basic visual, they stopped hurting themselves and caught half the balls.

 

That coaching was too remedial for the 8th grade boys who were 4 time city champs.  I coached them their routes and cuts with specific body movements, having their steps be an exact length before they cut and how to catch with their hands and pull it into their chest.

 

Those routes and techniques are too remedial for division 1 football players.

 

You can’t teach remedial ideas to more advanced players and you can’t teach advanced concepts to remedial players.

 

‘Be the ball Danny,” doesn’t work and a 12 handicap with basic knowledge can teach a beginner to swing a club without hurting themselves, but that won’t cut it as skill and understanding increase.
 

 

Edited February 25 by MonteScheinblum

[SNIPERBBB]

12 minutes ago, DwayneGretzky said:

“Let me see that swing Otto. Yeah, not sure you can own it, you see, you gotta feel the flow, like water. Bruce Lee that ball to draw back, Otto, be water, find it so you own it under pressure, become the ball!”

Also Otto, never play golf against against another player. If you do, play on closed course with 0 spectators or friends sworn to secrecy

Edited February 25 by SNIPERBBB

[byoung14]

There seems to be an uptick of anti-instruction threads popping up in the past 6 months or so and it’s almost always some frustrated person who tries to start arguments with no actual data or evidence backing their claims. People want to cheat the game by choosing to chase gimmick feels, thoughts and drills rather than actual taking the time to learn proper technique then when they fail to improve they come on here lashing out against any type of golf instruction/instructors.

[gentles]

2 hours ago, icehorse said:

 

Well it seems everyone on this thread has agreed that it's hard work to learn to hit golf balls well.

 

With that said, how do you know that your baseball background made learning golf any harder? What are you comparing your experience against? How do you that your baseball background didn't make learning golf - while still difficult - slightly less difficult than if you didn't have baseball skills?

sports where players tend to be good golfers - tennis, hockey, cricket, pitching 

 

sports where there doesn’t appear to be much crossover - anything else 

 

the first list are all sports that involve either a flat sided bat/stick or fine motor control with the wrists to control the ball. 
 

baseball bat has no “face angle” so the skill of controlling the angle of a face isn’t required compared to those other sports 

[MonteScheinblum]

18 minutes ago, gentles said:

sports where players tend to be good golfers - tennis, hockey, cricket, pitching 

 

sports where there doesn’t appear to be much crossover - anything else 

 

the first list are all sports that involve either a flat sided bat/stick or fine motor control with the wrists to control the ball. 
 

baseball bat has no “face angle” so the skill of controlling the angle of a face isn’t required compared to those other sports 

I will add QB and kickers.

 

QB’s and pitchers have won like 70% of the big celebrity event in Tahoe.

 

i have had a fair share of cricket players on my tee.  Good swings, but chronic slicers.

Edited February 25 by MonteScheinblum

[gentles]

11 minutes ago, MonteScheinblum said:

I will add QB and kickers.

 

QB’s and pitchers have own like 70% of the big celebrity event in Tahoe.

 

i have had a fair share of cricket players on my tee.  Good swings, but chronic slicers.

good point now that I think about it most of the good cricketers who make good golfers are actually the bowlers who much like a baseball pitcher require very fine control over the wrists and finger position on the ball

[MonteScheinblum]

1 hour ago, gentles said:

good point now that I think about it most of the good cricketers who make good golfers are actually the bowlers who much like a baseball pitcher require very fine control over the wrists and finger position on the ball

Haven’t had any bowlers, only batters, but that makes sense.

 

A good baseball swing is also a slice.  Open up, stay back and hold trail wrist.

 

Good pitching and throwing is shift forward while winding up, keep upper body closed, release wrist.  That’s a good golf swing.

Edited February 25 by MonteScheinblum

[golferdude54]

Everyone says OP is dodging but in my mind, it's more like this!

 

[GoGoErky]

3 hours ago, MonteScheinblum said:

Haven’t had any bowlers, only batters, but that makes sense.

 

A good baseball swing is also a slice.  Open up, stay back and hold trail wrist.

 

Good pitching and throwing is shift forward while winding up, keep upper body closed, release wrist.  That’s a good golf swing.

When I first started playing while also playing baseball/softball that’s all I hit. Huge banana balls thankfully there was a net on the right shade between the range and the road 

[mwiklund]

At the core of it, this is a really interesting topic and the OP has in my opinion a better starting point than the previous topics started by people with clear anti-instructional tendencies. I took the OP as an invitation to collect external cues / environmental constraints, which would not be a bad idea. However, the OP rejected bio-mechanical cues kind of categorically, which for reasons that should be obvious does rub many of the frequent and knowledgeable people on this forum the wrong way.  

 

I can see a clear trend toward coaches picking up on the advances made in motor learning theory etc. and looking at using external cues / environmental constraints to allow the student to explore different options to solving a movement problem, which in itself may be a worthwhile component in an overall player development plan.

 

However, this does not take the coach out of the picture. If (and when) exploration and self organisation leads to sub-optimal movement solutions to a problem, the coach needs to be there to help the student find other solutions or by changing the task.

 

For instance, the environmental constraint of the towel behind the ball can be solved in a very large number of ways. One of those solutions may be to get really steep on the ball paired with an excessive leftward swing path which will lead to problems down the line. Similarly, using a barrier to force a rightward path may be solved in ways which sacrifice AoA/Low Point, creating non-functional golf shots. If using both constraints (which could be an option) is too difficult to find a solve for the student, the coach better have a solid understanding of what part of the student's movement pattern that makes it difficult to find a solution.

 

Also, many environmental constraints which are worthwhile exploring from a general skill building perspective and which can be used as an intervention to shift the pattern of a student - hitting from up-/side-/downhill lies, fairway bunkers vs. deep rough, over/under/around trees, requires access to either top notch practice facilities or a course which allows for practicing and not only playing, AND if using the course, for the student to have available time to allocate to practice on course vs. simply playing - resources which are not easy to come by. Accordingly, the practice facilities also dictate what tools are available.

 

What I hear from the coaches at my son's club (budding competitive junior golfer), the Swedish Golf Association has noticed that the elite players that they are tracking and helping to develop tend to post their best scores early on in the season, i.e. after coming out of indoor practice with a more bio mechanical focus of cleaning up the technique by hitting from mats into nets, using video feedback. During the height of the competition calendar, many of the players start to regress due to the failure to make sure to keep their technical cues in check.

[MonteScheinblum]

10 minutes ago, mwiklund said:

At the core of it, this is a really interesting topic and the OP has in my opinion a better starting point than the previous topics started by people with clear anti-instructional tendencies. I took the OP as an invitation to collect external cues / environmental constraints, which would not be a bad idea. However, the OP rejected bio-mechanical cues kind of categorically, which for reasons that should be obvious does rub many of the frequent and knowledgeable people on this forum the wrong way.  

 

I can see a clear trend toward coaches picking up on the advances made in motor learning theory etc. and looking at using external cues / environmental constraints to allow the student to explore different options to solving a movement problem, which in itself may be a worthwhile component in an overall player development plan.

 

However, this does not take the coach out of the picture. If (and when) exploration and self organisation leads to sub-optimal movement solutions to a problem, the coach needs to be there to help the student find other solutions or by changing the task.

 

For instance, the environmental constraint of the towel behind the ball can be solved in a very large number of ways. One of those solutions may be to get really steep on the ball paired with an excessive leftward swing path which will lead to problems down the line. Similarly, using a barrier to force a rightward path may be solved in ways which sacrifice AoA/Low Point, creating non-functional golf shots. If using both constraints (which could be an option) is too difficult to find a solve for the student, the coach better have a solid understanding of what part of the student's movement pattern that makes it difficult to find a solution.

 

Also, many environmental constraints which are worthwhile exploring from a general skill building perspective and which can be used as an intervention to shift the pattern of a student - hitting from up-/side-/downhill lies, fairway bunkers vs. deep rough, over/under/around trees, requires access to either top notch practice facilities or a course which allows for practicing and not only playing, AND if using the course, for the student to have available time to allocate to practice on course vs. simply playing - resources which are not easy to come by. Accordingly, the practice facilities also dictate what tools are available.

 

What I hear from the coaches at my son's club (budding competitive junior golfer), the Swedish Golf Association has noticed that the elite players that they are tracking and helping to develop tend to post their best scores early on in the season, i.e. after coming out of indoor practice with a more bio mechanical focus of cleaning up the technique by hitting from mats into nets, using video feedback. During the height of the competition calendar, many of the players start to regress due to the failure to make sure to keep their technical cues in check.

Your last paragraph is an excellent observation.  The greatest success I had making people better at golf was during the Covid lockdown when the bias of ball flight didn’t deter people from improving their motions.  I was doing face time lessons with them on a small piece of turf and a net from Amazon.